Eur. Phys. J. B (2012) 85: 34
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2011-20457-6

Regular Article

Acceptor doping of single-walled carbon nanotubes by encapsulation of zinc halogenides

¹ Department of Materials Science, Moscow State University, Leninskie gory 1/3, 119991 Moscow, Russia
² Chemistry Department, Moscow State University, Leninskie gory 1/3, 119991 Moscow, Russia
³ Rare Metals Institute “GIREDMET”, B. Tolmachevsky 5, 119017 Moscow, Russia
⁴ Department of Materials Science and Engineering and A.J. Drexel Nanotechnology Institute, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
⁵ ALBA-CELLS, 08290 Cerdanyola del Vallès, Barcelona, Spain
⁶ Institute of Problems of Chemical Physics RAS, 1 Akademika Semenova st., 142432 Moscow Region, Russia

^a e-mail: mv.kharlamova@gmail.com

Received: 10 June 2011
Received in final form: 21 November 2011
Published online: 23 January 2012

Abstract

To modify the electronic properties of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs), ZnX₂@SWCNT (X  =  Cl, Br, I) nanostructures were prepared by capillary filling of 1.4–1.6 nm single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) with zinc halogenide melts. The loading factor is estimated as 30% for ZnCl₂ and approximately 60% for ZnBr₂ and ZnI₂. Well-ordered 1D crystals were observed by TEM only for ZnI₂@SWCNT. We propose two possible atomic structures of the 1D crystals, (Zn₄I₇)_n and less stable (Zn₄I₉)_n. According to the optical absorption and photoemission data, there is a charge transfer from the nanotube to the filler for all ZnX₂@SWCNT nanostructures. The results of the DFT PW-GGA modeling indicate that the acceptor properties correspond to (Zn₄I₉)_n only.